The impacts of cloud computing architecture on cloud service performance

In this study, cloud performance is benchmarked in the context of web service using a workload approach with cloud service architecture as a variable. Three sets of cloud service architectures are studied to measure their impact on cloud service performance. Set 1 compares coupled applications against decoupled applications service; Set 2 compares cached applications against non-cached applications service; and Set 3 compares applications with load balancing service against those without. Hypotheses are developed and benchmarking tests conducted to compare the differences in cloud service performance. Among the 3 sets of hypotheses, the statistical analysis results show the first and the third set of architectures have significant differences in cloud service performance, while the second set has no significant difference. The important implications are that cloud performance is a contextual variable; cloud service performance is a cloud architecture driver; and architecture options should be exhausted before other options are considered when cloud service performance needs to be improved.